Page:Distinguished Churchmen.djvu/276

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DISTINGUISHED CHURCHMEN

consequence of the appalling mortality amongst children in institutions, and the result was immediate and striking. We sometimes have cases of boys and girls who are beyond the age at which they can be properly trained. These are kept for a short time, provided with outfits, and then sent to sea, or domestic service, or emigrated.

“From those who have undergone our system of training, and gone out into the world to plod themselves, we get most encouraging and grateful letters from time to time. I recall several instances. There was one boy who tried to keep himself by sweeping a crossing, his nights being spent in a loft. His broom having been stolen from him, and his bread-winning in consequence becoming more difficult than ever, the Society went to his rescue, and placed him in one of the homes. After four years training, he was, at the age of fifteen, emigrated to Canada. A marked change came over the fortunes of that youth. Seven years after leaving England he wrote saying he was getting on very well, boarding with a family, the head of which is the organist and choirmaster of a church where the lad sang for three years and six months. ‘I left that church a month ago,’ he added, ‘and am now singing in, I suppose, the choir of the leading church in the Dominion, but still boarding with the same family. At present I get $6 or 24s. per week, upon which I am able to live comfortably and put a little by, a practice I learnt at the home.’ Having